What's going on in Greece?

MaxwellBygraves

You may have seen a lot of stuff about Greece on the news lately.

As it seems increasingly likely that a new round of elections will be held within the next few weeks, you are likely to hear a lot more too.

I spotted an excellent blog on the BBC website from Paul Mason on the Greek political party 'Syriza', who are likely to win the most votes in another election.

If you've got the time, I think it's an interesting read: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-18056677

rick_chasey

Mason's a hero.

Frank the tank

Europe is on a slippery slope. Ordinary people will only take so much and ultimately blood will end up being spilled to a lesser or greater extent.

It's all very worrying really.

bompington

TheStone

Whatever they do, the standard of living has to drop in Greece.

Bozman

Greece is just the start.

beverick

I think it's a very eloquent way of missing the point.

It's not down to some complex socio-political-economic mix. Last week's election results were purely a popularist vote supporting what the public see as being the only party that is willing to stick two fingers up to Greece's creditors and dump the austerity measures put in place following the last bail-out.

Bob

TheStone

beverick wrote:

It's not down to some complex socio-political-economic mix. Last week's election results were purely a popularist vote supporting what the public see as being the only party that is willing to stick two fingers up to Greece's creditors and dump the austerity measures put in place following the last bail-out.

Agree.

But it's ridiculous for Greece to think they can default and avoid austerity. Default will lead to a much quicker, forced austerity, but might be better for them in the long run.

daviesee

I don't think that the Greeks have fully grasped the concept that the Euro and related bailouts are Germany's ball.
And Germany are thinking of picking up the ball and going home.

(Loose generic metaphor).

rick_chasey

daviesee wrote:

I don't think that the Greeks have fully grasped the concept that the Euro and related bailouts are Germany's ball.
And Germany are thinking of picking up the ball and going home.

(Loose generic metaphor).

They have. That's what they don't like. Hence the burning of German flags etc.

daviesee

Rick Chasey wrote:

They have. That's what they don't like. Hence the burning of German flags etc.

Okay. They have grasped the concept.
Have they grasped the consequencies?

Aggieboy

daviesee wrote:

Rick Chasey wrote:

They have. That's what they don't like. Hence the burning of German flags etc.

Okay. They have grasped the concept.
Have they grasped the consequencies?

They'll have to knock out a few more olives.

Anonymous

Aggieboy wrote:

daviesee wrote:

Rick Chasey wrote:

They have. That's what they don't like. Hence the burning of German flags etc.

Okay. They have grasped the concept.
Have they grasped the consequencies?

They'll have to knock out a few more olives.

Maybe set up a tourism industry ?

rick_chasey

daviesee wrote:

Rick Chasey wrote:

They have. That's what they don't like. Hence the burning of German flags etc.

Okay. They have grasped the concept.
Have they grasped the consequencies?

Of course. Hence all the anger.

I don't think we quite appreciate how bad things are down there. NGO medical teams are moving out of sub-saharan Africa to Greece to help the massive problems many poorer greeks / immigrants are having.

It's really, really bad out there.

They're pretty desperate. It's easy to stand where we are and critique.

And as much as the consensus in Western Europe is that the pro-austerity gov't is the way forward, we haven't lived with their corruption which many there feel is the root of all this.

Frank the tank

I'm not saying the way forward for Greece is austerity or defaulting or whatever. All I'm saying is people will only take so much and when you see your already very limited finances getting squeezed ever tighter until you have nowt too loose how will those frustrations be expressed.

The (non)working masses will look for their own scapegoats and hate figures. Perhaps I'm being a bit melodramatic, but I don't think so. If I was starving the last thing I would want would be some pius polititian come telling me my suffering was for the greater good. As he got in his/her chauffeur limo back to their ivory tower.

MaxwellBygraves

Getting interesting - Merkel suffers election drubbing: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world ... 43508.html

Frank the tank

MaxwellBygraves wrote:

Getting interesting - Merkel suffers election drubbing: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world ... 43508.html

Not a mention of that on the news, as I've seen anyway.

Pross

It's basically what would be happening here if the OP had his way

Bobbinogs

I went to Greece for my family hols last year and was left feeling very deflated. When my wife and I went last time (probably 10 years ago) getting out there was the main expense and then it was a very cheap place to be...not last year. I ended up spending a fortune as everything was priced pretty much on a par with the rest of Europe, eating out, drinking, shopping in supermarkets, etc. I got through my 'spending' money in about 3 days and then had to go through loads more. I am not sure if this all was not an inevitable part of Greece joining the Euro but I cannot see me going back for quite a long time as there is much better value to be had elsewhere (and more road biking too).

MaxwellBygraves

Nice graph on election result, from left to right, nicked from BBC site:

verylonglegs

I read this very recently 'Greece is a bleak, unsmiling desert, without agriculture, manufactures or commerce, apparently. What supports its poverty stricken people or its Government is a mystery.' Found in 'Innocents Abroad' which was written by Mark Twain in 1869. Doesn't sound much different to today although we know what is supporting them at the moment.

MaxwellBygraves

Greek graffiti...



"We Are The First Droplets of An Approaching Storm"



"The duty to produce destroys the passion to create"

TheStone

But what are the options for Greece? I can only see 3:

1) Accept the handout and the terms that come with it (some austerity)

2) Full default (enforced austerity much deeper than 1)

3) Full default and leave the Euro. Print loads of money to avoid austerity. Major breakdown in 12-18 months.

MaxwellBygraves

Greek cartoon



"Bankruptcy will mean starvation."

"Is there any way to avoid bankruptcy?"

"Yes. Starvation."

Calpol

Greece is completely f**ked. The country has been completely out of control for some years. Some of the stories I have heard relating to the expansion of the public sector make the UK look like a labour camp. If you think we have too many civil servants doing nothing then take a trip to Greece. Tourism was their biggest source of GDP and over the last few decades their whole economy was built around sustaining those public services that even the richest countries cannot afford. It would be better to let it go bust in my opinion and let them start again. The only thing stopping that is that other governments don't want to crystalise their debt position with Greece which amounts to several billions plus the fear that Italy or Spain would be next. Whilst we are all wringing our hands over Greece it deflects attention from the almighty mess that other countries are in.

johnny.tifosi

Greetings from Greece.

The results of the elections come as no surprise to me. Greek people, and mainly the poor and the young, are suffering from the fierce austerity measures, such as a 30% decrease in wages and the great increase in taxes. The official unemployment percentage has rised from about 8% to 22% in a couple of years, and it rises to 50%(!) when it comes to young people. Our hospitals and schools are striving to function properly bacause of the budget cuts.

So, what would one vote?

The former “big” parties New Democracy (centre-right) and PASOK (originaly centre-left, then slided towards centre-right) are mainly in fault for our situation, because they have governed Greece since the fall of the military junta in 1974. Most people had voted for them at least once (sometimes they had a combined 86% in elections) and are very dissapointed, even enraged with them. Both parties were responsible for some major political scandals that cost millions of euros to Greece and no one was ever punished, and have contributed in corruption either on a big or a small scale. In my opinion, the only people that voted for them now are the elderly or the lower educated parts of the population, that fall victims of the propaganda of the gonernment-friendly media, and the people that benefited from these parties by getting a highly paid job in the public sector.

The former third party, now fifth, is the communist KKE. It has lots of devoted voters who will vote for it no matter what. As a result, it will never fall under 5%, but also it will never get over 8-9%, because of its old-fashioned opinions, its self-isolation from any other political party, and because it is the only party that openly states that it will lead Greece out of the Eurozone and the EU.

The former fourth party was the ethnicist LAOS that was part of the outgoing government. The continuous changes of the stance of its leader proved it was not a reliable party and therefore it was left out of the parliament in these election, getting a percentage lower than the 3% needed to be represented in the parliament.

Then there is Syriza. It was pretty much the only choice left for the part of the population that didn't want to vote for a right wing party (former PASOK voters, people hit by the crisis, young people in general). Its young leader Alexis Tsipras seems to charm people who do not want to vote for the two big parties anymore.

The Democratic Left party that splitted from Syriza in 2010 has accepted a bunch of former PASOK politicians and as a result lots of people faced it with skepticism.

The right-wing Independent Greeks party that splitted from New Democracy based its campaign on objecting to the austerity measures known as “memorandum” and regaining our sovereignty and it got an impressive 10% (we Greeks are very proud of our history and our battles to regain freedom with Greek Revolution, and during the WWII and the junta).

Finally, the rise of the far-right (many supect it to be neo-nazi) Golden Dawn came as a shock to the Greek society. It is the first time that such a party is elected in a counrty that suffered a lot from the Nazis during WWII and resisted heroically to them. It can be explained partly by the big problem of illegal immigration, mainly in the urban centres, that has upset the citizens, and partly by the loss of our sovereignty in the last 2-3 years. We all hope that Golden Dawn will stay outside of the parliament in the possible upcoming elections.

The euro did not bring any more prosperity in Greece. On the contary, it led to a big rise of the prices, as Bobbinogs observed. However, most people are afraid of returning to the drachma because it may cause even more poverty. The big public sector is a poor explanation of the crisis in my opinion. Lots of other european countries have bigger percentages of public servants than Greece. I believe that the irresponsible spending of public money by politicians (corruption, weapons etc.) and the decline of our productive basis since entering the EU are to blame. But above all there seems to be a macroeconomics explanation that has led so many European countries to the crisis (never forget Portugal, Ireland and Spain!) that I cannot quite understand. What I mean is that you shouldn't hate “those lazy southern bastards”, because some time even you, the richer countries of Europe, may come to the same position.

To summarise this long post, I believe that things will change only if the big countries of the Eurozone drop their hardcore austerity opinions that lead all the crisis-hit countries to a dead-end. We hope that the election of Francois Hollande in France is a step in the correct direction, and Merkel should follow Sarkozy's lead and go home.

EDIT: here is a nice post on the comedy site 9gag.com that explains what really happens in Greece: http://9gag.com/gag/2681884

Stevo_666

TheStone wrote:

But what are the options for Greece? I can only see 3:

1) Accept the handout and the terms that come with it (some austerity)

2) Full default (enforced austerity much deeper than 1)

3) Full default and leave the Euro. Print loads of money to avoid austerity. Major breakdown in 12-18 months.

Is option 2 a feasible option? The assumption was (as I understood it) was that a full default would lead to Greece's exit from the Euro.

OffTheBackAdam

Option 4)
Another fudge, more money pissed up against the Acropolis and default postponned for another x months.
Rinse & repeat.

CambsNewbie

Some of the storied that came out when this crisis started where amazing.. Schools with more teachers than students, a massively bloated civil service. apparently in the whole of Greece only 10,000 people admitted on their tax returns to earning over €100,000. Last year when I went to Rhodes (beautiful) there were taxi drivers who owned 3 or 4 villas they were renting out.

I really do feel for the people. It's sad to see a proud country with such an amazing history reduced to this. I love the country and will be doing my own little bit to help the Greeks by booking a holiday there! (some great deals at the moment!!)

rick_chasey

Stevo 666 wrote:

TheStone wrote:

But what are the options for Greece? I can only see 3:

1) Accept the handout and the terms that come with it (some austerity)

2) Full default (enforced austerity much deeper than 1)

3) Full default and leave the Euro. Print loads of money to avoid austerity. Major breakdown in 12-18 months.

Is option 2 a feasible option? The assumption was (as I understood it) was that a full default would lead to Greece's exit from the Euro.

S'how I see it too, it's stick with the EU and bite the bullet, or exit and hope the firewalls stop a Lehman mark 2 - now it's serious. I think with an exit, the question is how much will the financial system collapse in Greece? FT seems to think it will be pretty total.

Politically, the question is whether the Greeks continue to operate as a democracy. It may well be that for #1 to happen the EU will usurp the gov't and install technocrats ala Italy.

As an aside, was on a trading floor yesterday, and I noticed the guys already had the Drachma all ready set up in anticipation. Was a little odd.

Gazzaputt

Bloody hell booked to go the Crete in September with Thomas Cook. Double whammy?

I would like to how the tourist islands are fairing with all this.